It’s one thing for a tightly focused action game to focus on a single gimmick, and do it so perfectly that you have to sit up and pay attention. Terry Cavanagh’s Super Hexagon is one recent example. But it’s something else entirely when you play a few rounds of a new game and your only reaction is to shrug your shoulders.

Previous endless runners have exceeded Banana Kong in every way. Madcoaster is faster paced and more fluid. Ski Safari has a fun trick and combo system to master. Jetpack Joyride has much more personality and a better between-run goal system. Banana Kong, in comparison, is simply “okay” and nothing more.

A mountain of banana peels is no way for a gorilla to go out.

Like all endless runners, our hero (Mr. Kong? Banana?) runs automatically. A simple tap jumps, swiping down drops you to lower platforms, and swiping right activates a charge move to avoid imminent obstacles while temporarily draining your supply of gorilla energy. Along the way players will occasionally stumble into the treetops or into a foreboding cave system but most of the action in takes place in a nondescript jungle. Along the way players will get help from a pair of jungle animals and unlock some upgrades, but these too all feel by-the-numbers.

One detail I couldn’t quite wrap my head around – the cause of Banana Kong’s sudden flight is an incoming avalanche of… bananas. It’s an imposingly large banana mountain to be sure, but couldn’t he have been running from a flood, or an erupting volcano? Something a little more… imposing? You collect bananas while running from even more bananas. Fellow IGN Editor Greg Miller, lured in by Banana Kong’s admittedly catchy music, speculated that it was a mountain of banana PEELS chasing after the player. “It’s a mountain of trash, basically.” Fair enough, I suppose. A volcano still would have been better.

The Verdict

Banana Kong is a reasonably entertaining App Store distraction. It doesn’t commit any major stumbles but it also doesn’t display any ambition. There are other endless runners that have done it all better, faster and with more polish.